The present invention relates to a communication device using powerlines which can transmit and receive control data and so on by using the powerlines, and an LED (Light Emitting Diode) lighting system using the communication device which can control the LED lighting.
Recently, the interest on an illumination device or an illumination system using an LED (Light Emitting Diode) has increased dramatically. An LED lighting device has an advantage that power consumption might be less and their life is semi-permanent compared to a fluorescent lamp, an incandescent lamp, and a halogen lamp which have been previously used.
Lighting devices are installed at present in most households or buildings. These lighting devices are driven by using mostly alternating current with high power. In contrast, an LED is generally constructed by a PN junction structure and driven by using direct current with low power. The present LED lighting device has been developed and supplied in the light of compatibility of the existing lighting device and also suggested a construction which is directly connected with the existing electric wiring being supplied alternating current and then can be used. For this, a rectifying member and a separate driving member are equipped with the LED lighting device. Also, to solve the above problem, an LED driver in which an LED is driven by using alternating current has been introduced. However, there was a disadvantage that since the LED driver is very high-priced, the price of the lighting device becomes high.
On the other hand, an LED lighting device has an advantage that a lighting control, which is called a dimming control, is very easy. An LED illumination device can not only implement various illumination environments but also reduce more power consumption through a dimming control. This dimming control is realized through a method for controlling the amount of power being provided to an LED or an LED module. As mentioned above, a driving member for driving an LED or an LED module is equipped with an LED module or an LED lighting device. The driving member exercises, for example, a dimming control by controlling duty control (PWM: Pulse Width Modulation control) of driving power being supplied to an LED or an LED module. The driving member exercises a dimming control according to control data being supplied from the outside. The supply of control data to the driving member is performed by a separate communication member. On this account, a member for transmitting and receiving control data by wire or wireless is required to the driving member.
Generally, to perform wireless communication, many high-priced components are required. This causes increases of the manufacturing cost, power consumption, and the maintenance fee of the LED lighting device. Also, to perform wire communication, since a separate communication line is required, an installation work of a lighting device become cumbersome, especially, when installing an LED lighting device by using a light wiring which had been installed previously, there exist many difficulties.
Korean Patent No. 10-1142106 (title of invention: CONSTANT LED CONVERTER CAPABLE OF GROUP DIMMING) discloses that a device for controlling dimming of an LED group through a method for changing the size of input voltage supplying to an LED lighting device is introduced. In this patent, the supply power being supplied to an LED or an LED module is set and changed into, for example, 220V, 210V, 200V, and 190V and so on, and at an LED side, a converter controls properly the amount of power being supplied to an LED according to the voltage of the supply power being supplied from the outside, thereby controlling dimming.
However, in the above patent, a control member and a converter, that is, between driving members, the communication does not exercise, since only the converter exercises the dimming control based on the voltage of the driving power being supplied from the outside, various driving controls, that is, various dimming controls are impossible, especially, the stability of operation to an LED lighting device cannot be secured.
Also, Korean Patent No. 10-0261512 (title of the invention: REMOTE CONTROL DEVICE USING BI-DIRECTIONAL POWER LINE COMMUNICATION AND A CONTROL METHOD THEREOF) and Korean Patent No. 10-0473526 (title of the invention: REMOTE CONTROL DEVICE USING POWER LINE COMMUNICATION) disclose a construction that a bi-directional communion is performed by power line, thereby capable of remote controlling a power device. However, these devices have problems that a construction is complicate and its manufacturing cost is high.